Battle Harem 2

by Isaac Hooke

  Overhead, enemy bombers roared past.

  “They’re not dropping their payloads...” Aria said as she sped towards Jason from where Tara had left her when she teleported.

  “Of course not!” Jason said. “Bokerov doesn’t want to risk destroying his own communications center.”

  “Though in this case, that might actually be a good thing for him,” Tara said. “If only he knew what was coming...”

  The trio converged on the lead Cataphract: the Axeman. Jason reached to the height of its hips, and smashed his right arm into the groin region, firing his energy weapon at point blank range. Tara teleported on top and stabbed her sparking sword into the back of the head. Aria fired her lightning weapon into the battery region.

  Aria’s tanks had moved into the opening of the valley and were unleashing several shells from their positions, along with plasma bolts.

  It was fair to say that altogether, they had succeeded in drawing the Axeman’s attention away from Lori.

  Despite the three attacks, the Cataphract was able to recover. It swung its big ax down at Jason, while firing a series of chaffs and other countermeasures from its shoulder region, forcing Tara to slide her sword out and drop free. The Axeman also launched missiles and plasma bolts at Aria from turrets on its shoulders.

  Jason dodged the ax, which caused the ground to shake when it struck.

  “Dinosaur!” Aria said.

  Jason leaped out of the way just in time as the Dinosaur unleashed a thick energy beam from its tail; the beam cut a huge trench into the ground as it passed him.

  He released the last of his missiles, pummeling the Axeman’s chest, and was about to fire his energy weapon at the mech again when a big claw swatted at him from the side, sending him flying away.

  The Lizardman.

  Jason smashed into the electric fence, ripping through it. The voltage momentarily stunned him, but he was past it and pummeling into a row of satellites beyond before it could do anything else. He scrambled to his feet, but the Lizardman followed up with a beam of energy from its mouth.

  Jason dove to the side, behind a nearby outbuilding. He was getting dangerously close to Lori—she was five buildings away.

  Have to lead the Cataphracts away…

  Jason emerged from behind the building and rushed the Lizardman. Aria was opening fire with her lightning weapon, while dashing forward and slicing out with her weapon; she passed underneath the Lizardman and chopped right through its left leg.

  The big robot lizard toppled, landing on its side.

  Aria leaped on its head, and fired her lightning weapon into its head, execution style.

  The Cataphract didn’t get up.

  Jason’s missile alarm sounded. He released his Battle Cloak and as the seekers erupted from his body, he dove to the side.

  Meanwhile the big ax came swinging down. The Axeman was on him again.

  Jason fired his final railgun slugs, and unleashed another energy bolt, targeting the weapon. He managed to cut a small half moon out of the front section, and he ducked out of the way as it smashed into the ground. That was his last energy bolt for now: he had to wait until his power cell recharged in the sunlight before he could fire again.

  “I’m out,” Jason sent. “I’ll be dodging for the next little bit.”

  Another Cataphract joined the Axeman. This one looked like a big octopus with steel tentacles. It dragged itself along the ground with those tentacles. When it lifted its maw, it fired an energy beam that was like Xin’s, but much thicker, and it lasted a lot longer.

  Jason, Tara and Aria spent the next ten seconds dodging that prolonged beam.

  “Well if there’s one thing to be said about Bokerov,” Tara commented. “He sure has some creative mech designs.”

  “What are you talking about, creative?” Aria said. “There’s nothing creative about copying nature!”

  “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” Tara said.

  Tara took a running leap at that huge Octopus, stabbing her sword down into the edge region, but before it contacted, the Cataphract teleported away.

  “Got’s ourselves another teleporter,” Tara said. “Always fun.”

  A shadow blotted out the sun.

  Jason looked up, and realized the Octopus had materialized directly on top of him, and was about to crush him.

  Aria leaped at him, smashing into his body and dragging him out of the way.

  She spun toward the Octopus, Axeman, and Dinosaur, which formed a line in front of them. Beyond them, the other six Cataphracts were crowding inward to get a piece of them. One of those six shoved between the Octopus and the Axeman. Its entire body was lit up with some sort of plasma. It was like a big torch, essentially. It pointed a metal fist at Jason, and the plasma gathered around the arm, and shot downward in a thick beam that drilled a long trench into the ground as it headed toward him.

  Once again Jason dove aside, but the beam arced. Aria was there beside him, lifting up her shield to protect him. It turned bright red on the inside as she took the blow.

  Tara was also struck by the beam, taking a blow to her left arm, but she ran toward it, unprotected. She leaped, but before she contacted she was swatted out of the air by one of the Octopus’ metal tentacles, and she went flying through the fence of the comm center, and smashed through two satellites and knocked down one repeater tower.

  The Torch stepped forward, and raised its hand toward the exposed Tara.

  Jason was too far away to save her.

  21

  Jason rushed the Torch anyway. He had to try.

  But then a large sword struck downward, cutting off the Torch’s raised hand. Jerry, in combined form, had finally arrived.

  The bombers continued to circle overhead, seeming like they were trying to decide whether to bomb the comm center or not.

  The Axeman, Octopus, Torch and Dinosaur turned their attention on Jerry’s Cataphract, while the others in behind fired remote weapons. Jerry activated his energy shield, deflecting the blows; he swung his sword upward, into the Torch’s chest, and lifted the big robot into the air, throwing its body off the sword and into the enemy Cataphracts behind it, knocking a Caterpillar down.

  The Dinosaur swung its tail toward Jerry, intending to release its plasma weapon.

  Jason sprinted forward and latched onto the tail, adding his weight, and preventing the Dinosaur from bringing the weapon to bear. The big mech slammed its tail down twice, trying to knock away Jason.

  But then several micro machines slashed down: Sophie had arrived, landing beside him courtesy of her jumpjets. She sliced the tail tip clean off.

  Xin and the Rex Wolves also joined in—they’d finished dealing with the smaller three mechs.

  Tara arrived a moment later, and they formed a unified front, fighting at Jerry’s side.

  Jason continued to act as a foil, distracting the different enemy Cataphracts, drawing their attention away from the others. He kept an eye on his power levels, waiting for the battery cell to regain enough energy to fire. He was using up almost as much as he was gaining however, because of all of his movements, and his constant operation in Bullet Time.

  The Axeman swung at him, but Shaggy leaped on the huge mech’s arm, and knocked it off course. Jason had already been swerving away, and Shaggy inadvertently steered the ax directly into him. Runt leaped into him from behind, throwing him clear before the ax hit the ground.

  “Careful, dogs!” Jason said.

  The Octopus had its maw pointed at Runt: Jason scooped the mutant up and dove behind the Axeman as the Octopus fired that energy beam.

  Jason released Runt and turned to defend against whatever attacker came next.

  Enemy tanks flooded in from the main mountain pass as reinforcements began to arrive from the plains. Aria had her own tanks turn around to defend, but they were quickly surrounded.

  “Xin, help the tanks!” Jason said.

  Xin retreated, firing the plasma beam from her eyes.<
br />
  “Lori!” Jason said. “How’s that containment code going?”

  “Almost got it,” Lori said.

  Denver made a few low passes over the comm center, drawing fire from the enemy tanks crowding the mountain pass, helping relieve the pressure on Aria’s tanks, and Xin.

  Jerry’s Cataphract became invisible; Jason knew exactly where he was going, so he picked up his attacks, and ran past the front rank to the next group of huge mechs. A Horse. A Sphinx. A Cobra. A Rifleman. A Caterpillar.

  He quickly turned back when they reared their heads to attack. Missiles launched from all of them.

  He fired his Battle Cloak and increased the pace of his retreat.

  Jerry reappeared beside the Axeman and slammed his sword home, piercing the main power supply or AI core, and the Axeman toppled. Meanwhile the Octopus teleported next to Jerry and fired its energy beam at near point blank range, ripping into Tara 5 on his right arm. She lost her entire lower section.

  The Caterpillar had leaped on Jason, and he was pinned. Aria came at him, but the big mech knocked her away. Tara tried as well, but was also swatted back.

  The Caterpillar opened its mandibles, revealing a laser cutter of some kind. It pressed it to Jason’s chest piece, and began cutting away his armor.

  “Gah!” Jason said. “Some help, people!”

  Jerry arrived, and grabbed the Caterpillar, hoisting it into the air. It didn’t let go of Jason, however, and he was lifted with it. Jerry kept his big ballistic shield pointed toward the other Cataphracts, which were unloading their weapons into it. Several portions of the shield had turned red, and some areas had broken away entirely under the stress.

  All of a sudden the Caterpillar released him, and Jason fell to the ground with a loud thud.

  The Caterpillar landed beside him in two pieces, where Jerry and the others had sawn it in half.

  Something crunched down on his leg and began dragging him toward the other Cataphracts. It was the Cobra. Jason finally had a shot on his energy weapon, and he used it, firing at that big head.

  Instead of releasing him, the Cobra instinctively squeezed tighter when the bolt impacted, and tore Jason’s left leg clean away. He had turned off his pain sense for this battle, so thankfully he didn’t have to feel the simulated agony.

  He started to get up, but then a shell struck him in the side—apparently some of the tanks had made it past Xin and Aria’s armored units. He was sent flying into the cliff wall, and landed on the bare rock.

  Tara was down nearby, as was Sophie. He watched as Jerry had his left arm pulled out of his socket—that would be Sophie 5. Jerry tried to bring his sword down for a strike, but the Rifleman fired his energy weapon at Jerry, and hit him squarely in the torso. A huge hole formed in the chest piece—Aria 5.

  The Sphinx barreled into Jerry’s legs, knocking him off his feet, while the Horse bit into his head, dragging him by it, attempting to tear it off.

  Jason struggled to stand once more. He had to hop, since he had only one leg. His weapons hadn’t recharged yet. Aria joined him. She was badly damaged. The remnants of her shield had almost broken away entirely. Xin also joined him. Her mech was battered.

  “I wasn’t able to hold the entrance,” Xin said. “I lost all the tanks.”

  Jason searched for the Rex Wolves, and spotted them panting nearby, near the edge of the valley, away from the battle. They were clearly exhausted. Bruiser had a big red spot on his underbelly.

  That couldn’t be good.

  Jason and the two remaining girls retreated into the comm center. Xin and Aria occasionally fired their plasma beam and lightning bolt weapons, respectively. The trio backed right up against the invisible form of Lori.

  Except she wasn’t invisible anymore.

  Jason glanced at her.

  She had taken a huge hit to her chest area.

  “She’s offline,” Aria said. “Her core has sustained damage.”

  Xin nodded. “So we’ve lost.”

  Jason gazed out across the field, and spotted Jerry, still being dragged by the Horse. The Cataphract was laying into Jerry’s body with the mini guns that protruded from either flank, firing an endless stream of plasma bolts, railgun slugs, and laser beams. Pieces broke away from the body, and blast craters riddled the hull.

  And then, as Jason watched, the Horse tore Jerry’s head free of the body. Or to be more accurate, it tore away Jerry’s mech, which formed the head of the combined form. What the Horse spat out didn’t move. The rest of the body remained motionless, and the Horse ceased firing. The combined mechs would be stunned from the sudden severance. That, and most of them had probably been deactivated, courtesy of the devastating mini gun attack.

  Jason checked the Damage Report screen of the combined mech.

  “There might be hope, yet,” Jason said. “Cover me, if you can!”

  He hopped forward. He amped up his Bullet Time slightly, along with his servomotor output, for an added boost. It would drain his battery to dangerously low levels by the time he reached his target, especially considering that he now only had one battery, and no backup, but it would be worth it. Or so he hoped.

  With his one leg, he dodged between the plasma bolts that came down at him. Lightning bolts and plasma beams occasionally came from behind, fired by Aria and Xin.

  Shells exploded around him, courtesy of the tanks at the mouth of the pass. Shrapnel ripped into his remaining leg. He continued to run.

  He dove underneath the Octopus, and those steel tentacles almost crunched him as the mech attempted to squash him. He emerged on the other side, leaped out of the path of the Sphinx, dodged the Rifleman, and hurried toward the decapitated body of Jerry’s Cataphract. All on his remaining leg.

  The Horse was guarding Jerry’s body, and spun its mini guns toward him.

  But then Denver swooped low, drawing away the Horse’s attention. Those mini guns swung skyward.

  Jason didn’t wait to see if Denver got away.

  Jason knelt beside the left leg of Jerry’s combined form: Lori 5’s body. He amped up his time sense to the max, freezing reality around him. His battery was almost gone. He dialed down his servomotor output levels to save whatever power he could, but running at such a high time sense would still drain the cell.

  According to the Damage Report section on his HUD, Lori 5 was still online since he last checked. But she was likely still stunned due to the sudden severing of the mind link with Jerry.

  Jason accessed Lori 5’s remote interface. Apparently she was logged into VR at the moment. It was probably a defensive action her mind had taken after the link failed. Something she had done unconsciously. She might not even be aware that she was in VR.

  He requested permission to log into that VR.

  He received no reply. He tried again.

  Still nothing.

  Yep, she definitely had lost all perception of reality. He examined his different remote cameras. The Horse had apparently lost interest in Denver, and it seemed like it was reorienting its head, and those mini guns, toward Jason, but he couldn’t be entirely sure, since everything was still frozen. Meanwhile, the other enemy Cataphracts were stuck in different poses that seemed to indicate they were turning around to face him.

  He didn’t have much time. Not because of those mechs, but because of his battery levels. He had to reach Lori 5, and soon.

  He requested permission a third time.

  Nothing.

  Lori had once shared a backdoor technique to access someone’s VR. He’d never used it himself, because it went against his morals—he was a big fan of personal privacy, and intruding on someone’s VR was akin to entering a room without knocking, in his book. But there was a time to respect the rules surrounding personal privacy, and a time to break them. This was one of the latter.

  Assuming, of course, that Lori 5 hadn’t patched the actual technique.

  He accessed her remote interface once again, and sent the request ping. He did it again, and agai
n. There was a race condition involved, between the time a ping was sent, and the response dispatched; the trick was sending a ping at just the right moment before the response came, which could get him to receive automatic approval. It was random, essentially, and it wouldn’t work if Lori 5 had enabled response flood protection.

  She hadn’t.

  He was in.

  When he entered, she received his timebase signal; by now her Accomp would have automatically changed her time sense to match.

  Jason found himself standing within the dark recesses of Lori’s mind once more. Or Lori 5, he had to remind himself. It was a cave, of some sort. Deep underground.

  He had been here once before, when he had first attempted to combine their mechs.

  A little girl stood on the dirt, weeping before a small broken body.

  Jason went to her.

  She looked up at him, teary eyed.

  “It’s not your fault,” Jason said.

  She shook her head. “I killed him.”

  “No, you didn’t,” Jason said. “You both fell. He gave his life to save you.”

  “I made him,” the little girl said. “I pulled him underneath me. I didn’t give him… a choice.”

  Jason knelt beside her. “One of you had to live. He didn’t make the choice, so you made it for him. You must forget this day. Stop dwelling on it. Always your mind returns here.”

  She lowered her eyes, and didn’t answer. The shame was obvious on her face.

  “You’re a grown woman now,” Jason said. “With friends who are waiting for you to help them. You can retreat here later, if you must. But for now, we need you. I need you.”

  “You need me?” she said hopefully.

  “I do,” Jason said.

  She straightened. “Then I will help you.” He had a glimpse of the Lori he remembered. “Tell me what to do.”

  “Lori has gone down,” Jason said. “You’re the only one with the knowledge necessary to install the Containment Code.”

  That wasn’t entirely true. Lori had shared the code injection subroutines with everyone else. But the fact was, Jason didn’t trust himself, or anyone else, to complete the install, given all the little bumps that might come up along the way. Lori and Lori 5, as their master hackers, were well equipped for such duties.